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Spike Lee edits Eric Garner video with Radio Raheem death scene in 'Do The Right Thing'

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Cell phone video showing a police officer dragging Eric Garner, 43, to the floor after putting him in what appears to be a chokehold outside a beauty supply store in Tompkinsville. (Courtesy of Youtube)

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Director Spike Lee edited together the now-infamous cell phone video which shows a police officer putting 43-year-old Eric Garner in an alleged chokehold during an incident in Tompkinsville on Thursday, with footage from his 1989 film "Do the Right Thing."

The writer and director posted a link to the 59-second clip, calling it "Radio Raheem And The Gentle Giant," on his personal YouTube account, also linking to it on his Twitter and Instagram accounts.

The footage cuts back and forth between reality and Lee's movie, drawing comparisons between the police brutality the director attempted to highlight in his film with the methods officers on Staten Island used to arrest Garner.

Police have said Eric Garner went into cardiac arrest after officers attempted to arrest him on charges of selling untaxed cigarettes. He was pronounced dead shortly after at Richmond University Medical Center, West Brighton.

In a cell phone video taken as the scene unfolded on Bay Street Thursday, Garner can be heard repeatedly gasping, "I can't breathe! I can't breathe!"

After Lee shows the death of his character, he ends the edited clip with the cell phone footage of Garner lying motionless on the ground.